The latest from NVidia's website, or the several years old one from Microsoft?

And I haven't heard other reports of this that I recall. And at the time the splash screen is displayed, Photoshop hasn't started it's GPU code and is relying entirely on the OS code to display the dialog (with transparency, drop shadows, etc.).

The one from the Nvidia. Also, I don't appreciate smugness. The fact that you haven't heard of this, doesn't make it impossible. What I mean is that the splash screen is being drawn with the help of some library of sorts. Same as the Photoshop interface is being drawn over the MFC window. Since this happens to all apps, it's not photoshop-specific. Also, after the flickering, Photoshop's interface is somewhere between skinned and MFC-like windows. Parts are skinned, parts are unskinned.

Solved the problem. You were correct with the assumption that the OS might be to blame. I've noticed that the Aero theme was switched off during the flickering phase, so I decided to switch off desktop composition (Computer > Properties > Advanced > Performance > Settings > Enable desktop Composition - ticked off.)

After switching off Desktop Composition, the flickering stopped.

It would be nice if people were aware of this though or at least if you guys could put Photoshop into some type of compatibility mode.

Again, I have not seen other reports of this issue. My guess is that there is something a little different about your system config that triggers the bug in the OS compositing code, then the use of transparency in the Photoshop splash screen makes it visible. I don't recall any compatibility mode options for this sort of issue, but I'll have to review that with our Microsoft UI team contacts (and see if they have heard of similar reports).

Do you need me to send you a nfo file with system configuration ? It's using a NVIDIA® Quadro® K3100M video graphics card, respectively Intel® HD Graphics 4600. The dock model is HP 90W Docking Station. I think the last bit might be especially helpful.